As a reasonable person, I’ve always said that the day that major MMOs like World of Warcraft and Everquest are readily available on mobile platforms will be heralded as the day productivity died. That being said, Blizzard will not accept no for an answer, and is always on the lookout for a way to bring World of Warcraft to the iPhone.
Speaking to Eurogamer, Senior WOW Producer John Lagrave discussed the challenges involved in bringing a massive online game to such a small platform, from UI to controls, to chat and beyond.
“So we certainly look at that, but we just haven’t solved it. What we’ve done with WOW on mobile devices is very simplistic: view the armoury, you check your auctions – not just on mobile but also on web.
So it might be a while before you are explaining to your boss that you were only late from lunch because the Lich King was tanking more damage than usual, but if Blizzard has any say in it that time will be sooner than you think.
As a college student living off of what I can, I am sympathetic to the plight of people who cannot afford to buy a new computer. Unfortunately, the time comes in any game’s life where those who for one reason or another are unable to upgrade, are left behind, and generally developers ensure that this comes at a time when it affects as few customers as possible. After all, no one likes having a game they bought and probably invested in subscriptions or cash shop items stripped away from them.
For Guild Wars, Arenanet has announced that on June 14th, 2012, the game will no longer support Windows 95, 98, 98SE, and Millenium Edition. According to Stephane Lo Presti, this should impact less than .05% off the community.
Since the launch of Guild Wars in 2005 we’ve stayed locked into our original minimum system requirements. Unfortunately, the game has reached a point where this is preventing us from deploying important features.
For Wine users, whether or not Guild Wars will still function is up in the air as it is unsupported.
I love sandbox MMOs and nothing gives me a better feeling than having a good discussion around what the genre needs to evolve. In the past, I’ve used this website to discuss my discontent with the fact that sandbox MMOs could be so much more but often devolve into random death matches with extensive crafting systems implanted. A lot of this stems from the freedom and punishment system, what the developers allow players to do and what players can expect to be “punished” for doing. For the sake of this conversation, I am not referring to bug abuse or exploits, but intentional systems that are purposefully planted to create gameplay.
Here at MMO Fallout, I adhere to the basic process that the community reflects the game, it isn’t a coincidence. So if you have a game where resources can be drained permanently (Wurm Online), you will have players dedicated to draining those resources if only to ensure that no one else can have them. If your game centers around player vs player combat, than you will form a community of gankers and player killers. And, of course, if you create a world that is completely safe you will end up with high-end characters who may have never figured out basic features.
By implementing features in a game and then telling players that they are expected to not engage in such activity, the activity itself simply becomes more appealing to a wider base. Ren and Stimpy fans will know this as the big red button effect.
That being said, sandbox MMOs are all about having a certain level of freedom above and beyond other games, and that level of freedom opens the door for people to act like jerks. Let’s go back to the resource drain conversation: Say you wanted it to be possible for players to deforest an area in order to construct buildings in the new fields. How do you stop a clan of people from griefing and deforesting large portions of the map for little more than “giggles?” The answer I get from developers is “we let the community police itself.”
I can’t say this enough: The community doesn’t police itself. No one is going to stop Tom over there from deforesting the neighborhood, and odds are no one will come to the defense when Tom heads over to the newbie zone in full top-level gear and starts a genocide of new players. I’ve played far too many free for all sandbox MMOs to know that this community policing never happens. In Eve Online, players have a measure of built-in defense in the form of high security space with NPC guards. For MMOs like Mortal Online, you are either in 10.0 (highest security) or 0.0 (lowest), there is no middle ground.
There are many ways to deal with our lumberjack Tom. A system of fatigue can make it prohibitive for a small group to deforest an area. Allowing players to take ownership of land and situate NPC guards to keep out specific players known to grief, having only certain trees able to be uprooted, or making the replanting of trees just as easy as the destruction. This goes back to the original problem, however, of requiring a developer willing to implement systems more complicated than solving all of your problems by stabbing them.
Some MMOs solve this with automated prison systems: Become a notorious criminal and you will eventually be caught and thrown in jail, where you will be forced to do menial repetitive tasks in order to be released. Just recently I talked about the plan in Dominus to allow players to put bounties on gankers, going as far as allowing the player to keep reissuing the bounty as long as he can afford to pay for it, and selectively choosing who is allowed to take on the bounty.
Preventing lumberjack Tom from deforesting an area with his cohort of griefers is a much more difficult task than punishing someone for killing too many newbies, and I’ll admit that my ideas presented above may not be reasonable when experimented in an actual sandbox MMO. But if a developer wants to put in a system by which players can theoretically drive a species to extinction, or deforest a zone, or deplete an area’s resources, they need to have some sort of system in place to compensate for when such an event occurs, because it will happen without a doubt and when players feel that they are unable to do anything about griefing, the number of players griefing will increase and the grieved will simply quit.
And I don’t want to imply that our Tom character is always a jerk, or a bad person. MMOs by nature attract players who strive to do the impossible, often for no reason other than to say that they were able to do it. Everquest created a dragon that could not be killed, players worked tirelessly to try and kill it. World of Warcraft placed its bosses in open world environments, players managed to rope them into major cities.
There is a middle ground between freedom and regulation that sandbox MMOs need in order to survive, which is why more structured titles like Eve Online have gathered more than 350,000 subscribers and on the opposite end we have games like Mortal Online and its inability to profit, and Earthrise bankrupting its developer.
I would love to see Eve Online’s structure translated to a fantasy-themed MMO.
Here at MMO Fallout, I like to take rumors and expand on them in theory rather than posting a simple “this might come out,” so at least if the game does turn out to be fake, we had a decent discussion. With the rumored upcoming announcement of the Elder Scrolls MMO, an announcement that will be about as surprising as Earthrise shutting down, I got to thinking: What would I be willing to sacrifice for an Elder Scrolls MMO? The answer? I’ll have to get back to you.
I have a certain disconnect with MMOs. Games like World of Warcraft and Everquest are enjoyable, and I take particular joy in building a character and giving him far more of a back story than is really necessary, but I have no emotional investment in anything that goes on in my quest grind to end-game or boredom, whichever comes first. Unlike most single player games, I am constantly reminded that I am indeed knee deep in slow moving pepper grinder, making my way up to the fate of endless raiding. The quest logs lining the side of my screen, hotbars down below, enemies that are impossible to defeat until I turn in a quest, level up, and can suddenly knock them upside the head without missing a beat.
But more so, it is the community that ruins my sense of immersion. I may not be a real general in the fight against hell, nor have I traversed the real land of the elves, and you won’t find my blaster in a sand dune on Tatooine, but any immersion I would have had in the game goes right out the door when I enter the first area and see names that amount to the creativity that might bleed out of a preteen AOL Instant Messenger chat room. And I’m not even going to include the thousands of Legolas and Gordon Freeman I’ve seen. As a writer, I understand that sometimes people just want to play as their favorite characters.
I’m talking about seeing xXxPwnNoObzxXx, or FkdUrMum95, or screen names that look like the person rolled their hands on the keyboard. The names serve an important purpose, no doubt: They are a free beacon to let me know who to avoid, because odds are engaging in discussion with players like FkdUrMum95 is just going to lead to the filling of my ignore list.
Is my stand elitist? Probably, I’d like to say that it isn’t. I log into World of Warcraft knowing that I will likely have my sexuality, weight, and social life questioned, someone will attempt to scam me, Chuck Norris jokes, Chuck Testa jokes, the cake is a lie, my mother is a ho, and at least one high level player will be complaining that his meme-based name was in style back when he created the character, and now he is stuck with it. But after ten straight years of Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim, I’ve come to expect something of a serious atmosphere. One without people bunny-hopping all over the map and playing dance emotes while saying “stripping 4 gold, plz tip,” one without the ridiculous holiday events that break immersion, where I am the sole hope for the survival of the world, and more importantly: One where the game isn’t compromised for the sake of building a world where thousands of people can interact online.
So I will play Elder Scrolls Online, but for me it will be a cheap imitation. Sure it may look like Elder Scrolls, taste like Elder Scrolls, and may fill me up, but it won’t grant the satisfaction of a true offline Elder Scrolls title.
Here at MMO Fallout, I’ve devised a sport known as “competitive charity,” a corporate sport where the rules are simple: Donate more than anyone else to a respectable charity and you win the prize. What is the prize? We haven’t figured that out yet, but it is in progress. So far, competitive charity has been extremely successful, with a majority of the companies listed here at MMO Fallout participating on an occasional basis.
Over at Bioware, the Mass Effect community decided to express its outrage at the ending of Mass Effect 3 in the only way it knows how: Throwing the rules of competitive charity right out the window and starting up a charity fund. So far, over two thousand contributors have donated more than fifty three thousand dollars to Child’s Play. Sure, it’s an odd marriage: The joy of charity and the general useless endeavor that is an internet protest.
This is my kind of protest, and I’m sure Child’s Play is just as happy as I am to see the money rolling. The charity drive runs until April 11th. If you want to chip in, or just want to donate to Child’s Play, click below. I will also have a counter running on the side of MMO Fallout until the charity ends.
Diablo 3 is here! Well, the release date and ability to pre-purchase is. While many of you who subscribed to the World of Warcraft annual pass (monthly payments, but locked in for a year) did so for the free mount and beta access to Mists of Pandaria, you may have also done so for the free copy of Diablo 3 that comes with it. Possibly, I don’t want to assume anything.
Now that Diablo 3 has a release date, May 15th, Blizzard has announced that the promotion is coming to a close. If you want that free Diablo 3, you will need to purchase the World of Warcraft annual pass by May 1st, after which your commitment will only net you a free mount and beta access to Mists of Pandaria.
Everquest goes free to play this Friday and in preparation Sony has released a Frequently Asked Question list that covers everything, and I do mean everything. The list is enormous, and many questions overlap one another, so I’ve decided to create a list to consolidate most of the important points.
There will be multi-month subscriptions at a reduced rate. Existing subscriptions will become gold.
You need a reoccurring subscription for the monthly 500 station cash. If you have station pass, the EQ and EQ2 monthly cash does not stack. Yearly subscribers will receive 500 station cash monthly.
You will receive 500 station cash from each game if you subscribe separately (no station pass), but this is not advisable.
Silver membership is an upgrade in the store for 500 station cash, it is a separate purchase and should not be confused with “spend 500 station cash.”
All accounts will be upgraded to House of Thule, gold members will still have to buy Veil of Alaris if they haven’t already.
Alternate advancement point cap can be raised.
Legends of Norrath cards will still be handed out each month.
Free Limitations:
If you allow your subscription to expire, your gold races/classes will be locked. You will have to resubscribe or purchase to unlock those characters.
If you purchase Veil of Alaris, you still have access to it if your subscription lapses.
Free/Silver can buy from the bazaar but cannot use “trade mode.”
If you drop back to free with gold rank spells, you will keep the spells but they will only have rank 1 effectiveness.
You will not lose any platinum if you are over the limit and lapse, you will simply not be able to gain more currency.
Prestige gear (gold only) will not be lost on lapse of subscription, it cannot be used.
House of Thule augments are prestige, this will change when free to play comes.
Everquest goes free to play this Friday and in preparation Sony has released a Frequently Asked Question list that covers everything, and I do mean everything. The list is enormous, and many questions overlap one another, so I’ve decided to create a list to consolidate most of the important points.
There will be multi-month subscriptions at a reduced rate. Existing subscriptions will become gold.
You need a reoccurring subscription for the monthly 500 station cash. If you have station pass, the EQ and EQ2 monthly cash does not stack. Yearly subscribers will receive 500 station cash monthly.
You will receive 500 station cash from each game if you subscribe separately (no station pass), but this is not advisable.
Silver membership is an upgrade in the store for 500 station cash, it is a separate purchase and should not be confused with “spend 500 station cash.”
All accounts will be upgraded to House of Thule, gold members will still have to buy Veil of Alaris if they haven’t already.
Alternate advancement point cap can be raised.
Legends of Norrath cards will still be handed out each month.
Free Limitations:
If you allow your subscription to expire, your gold races/classes will be locked. You will have to resubscribe or purchase to unlock those characters.
If you purchase Veil of Alaris, you still have access to it if your subscription lapses.
Free/Silver can buy from the bazaar but cannot use “trade mode.”
If you drop back to free with gold rank spells, you will keep the spells but they will only have rank 1 effectiveness.
You will not lose any platinum if you are over the limit and lapse, you will simply not be able to gain more currency.
Prestige gear (gold only) will not be lost on lapse of subscription, it cannot be used.
House of Thule augments are prestige, this will change when free to play comes.
Last month I posted an article about a 14-day membership for new accounts. The trial was unannounced and held rather ambiguous requirements as to who could participate (at the time it appeared to be UK-only), and remained unmentioned by Jagex until later in the month when Mod Hippo posted to announce that the trial had ended.
With today’s update to RuneScape, it appears that the trial is back. Upon character creation, users are reporting seeing this:
I am checking up on the RuneScape forums to see if I can find any comment by Jagex staff and will update with any more information.
You know you’ve been wanting to try out those Old Republics that the kids all seem to be getting into these days. But you don’t want to spend sixty bucks on a game client for a title you might not enjoy? Well, Bioware has your back. Starting March 15th and going through March 19th, you will be able to play The Old Republic absolutely free of charge. There are restrictions: Level is capped to 15 (40 for trade skills) and bound to origin/capital worlds. Weekend pass holders will also be restricted from general/trade/pvp chat, cannot send or reply to email, use the galactic trade network.
It is worth noting that this is not a welcome back weekend, and the offer does not extend if you already own The Old Republic. Prior subscribers who have allowed their payments to lapse are not included in this weekend. If you purchase The Old Republic during this time, the start of your subscription will cancel any remaining time in the weekend pass, so wait until the 19th to redeem your code.
Also, there is a small note that Bioware reserves the right to delete trial characters on abandoned accounts without notice, although there are no plans to do so at this moment.
No, there are currently no plans to delete characters created as part of the Friends of Star Wars: The Old Republic Trial. Should your friend decide to purchase the Game, their trial characters will still be on their account. We do however reserve the right to delete trial characters on abandoned trial accounts without notice.
Speaking to Eurogamer, Senior WOW Producer John Lagrave discussed the challenges involved in bringing a massive online game to such a small platform, from UI to controls, to chat and beyond.
MMO Fallout 